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 CHAPTER TENTH.
MAUT-A-MUA.

The great Hatasu was no more and after her no woman held such
extended and absolute sway. The next queen whose name occurs at
all prominently is Maut-a-mua, or Maut-em-va, “Mother of the boat,”
wife of Tahutmes IV and mother of Amenophis III. She appears to
have held the regency after her husband’s death till her son
assumed full power, or if not actually in this official position, to have
had great influence with him. The tie between mother and son was a
close one and even his marriage did not seem to weaken it.
But before entering upon such fragmentary history of her as
remains to us it may be well to enumerate briefly the lists of
sovereigns which connects Hatasu or Hatshepsut with her great
grandson’s or great nephew’s wife. Her half-brother or step son-in-
law, Tahutmes or Thothmes III, sometimes called the Alexander of
Egypt, who succeeded or wrested the power from her hands, had a
long reign of fifty-three or fifty-four years. Hatshepsut died at fifty-
nine, and Tahutmes III ascended the throne at thirty-one years of
age. The computation of his reign probably dates from the time he
was first associated with his sister or stepmother in the regal power.
He was one of the most noted of the Egyptian kings, laid aside the
peace policy of his predecessors and entered on a series of wars and
conquests, marked with many cruelties. The records of his military
expeditions are said to give us great insight into the condition of
Syria and Palestine about the fifteenth century B. C. He, like his
predecessor, was interested in architecture, builded and added to the
temples and showed individual taste in his additions. He has left
more monuments behind him than any of the Egyptian kings but
Rameses II. He built at Heliopolis, Memphis, Thebes, Elephantine
and nearly every town in Nubia. Four of his obelisks have come
down to us—one in Rome, one in Constantinople, one in London and
one in New York. These last bear the popular title of “Cleopatra’s
needle,” though erected in a much earlier time than the era of that
renowned queen. The first, “the greatest of all extant monoliths,” is
standing before the church of St. John Lateran, at Rome. Many,
many years were occupied in its preparation. Obelisks were generally
erected in pairs and occasionally several of them in succession
formed an avenue. In the temple of Deir el Bahri are pictures of
Hatshepset and Tahutmes III making offerings to the gods. Says
Baedaker: “On the upper part of the right wall is a noteworthy
scene. Makere, Hatshepsut I, Thutmosis III, and the Princess
Ranofru sacrificing to the boat of Ammon, behind which stands
Thutmosis I with his consort, Aahmes, and their little daughter,
Binofru. A similar scene was represented above the recess on the
left wall; the kneeling Thutmosis III and the Princess Binofra may
still be distinguished.” The statues of Tahutmes III are numerous,
but not colossal.
He “took to wife” in the old Eastern phrase, Hatasu-Meri, daughter
of the great Hatshepsut and his own near relative, but our
knowledge of her is extremely limited. She evidently did not inherit
her mother’s characteristics and possibly did not live any great
length of time. Or if her husband transferred to her any portion of
the dislike which he so evidently bore her mother he may have
purposely kept her in the background, but in any case she cannot be
looked upon as an assertive character. Her second name is given as
Meri or Merira and there is a picture of her on a throne behind, not
beside, her husband. She is, however, attired as a goddess, with
whip, ankh and tall plumes. This is at Medinet Habu; again she is
spoken of as Meryt-ra Hatshepset, mother of Amenophis II, and a
scene in a tomb represents her, accompanied by her son. A female
sphinx representing her with her husband’s name inscribed was
found in the temple of Isis and is now in the Baracco collection at
Rome and casts are at Turin and Berlin. One inscription, and possibly
more, remain, however, speaking of her as “beloved consort,” or
some other form expressing a degree of affection, but at this late
period it is impossible to determine whether it was the usual
conventional phrase or had some foundation in truth. She lived and
died, but whether her life was a long and happy one or short and
sorrowful we cannot tell.
The reign of Tahutmes III is among the longest in history. It was,
however, exceeded by some monarchs, Louis XIV, seventy-two
years. George III and Queen Victoria over sixty, Henry III occupied
the throne fifty-six years, Edward III fifty, and there was also one of
the Mogul Emperors, as well as others. A glass vase in the British
Museum, said to be the oldest in existence, bears the name of
Tahutmes III. There are various mementoes or memorials of him in
different places, the most personal perhaps, his coffin, much
damaged and stripped of its gilding, which may be seen in the Gizeh
Museum.
Amenophis or Amenhotep II, son probably of Hatasu-Meri,
succeeded his father. Of him also we read as a warrior and a cruel
one, bringing back the bodies of several kings whom he had slain
with his own hand. The Egyptians were said not to be so cruel in
battle as the Assyrians, but there seems little to choose between
them. There is a picture of Amenophis II on the wall at Abd-el-
Gurneh, as a child on the lap of a nurse, the heads and backs of five
Asiatics serving him as a footstool, implying doubtless that he
himself would be, or his father before him had been, a warrior and a
conqueror. There is also a kneeling statue of him, in later life,
holding a globular vase in his hand. He succeeded to the throne
when young, perhaps at eighteen, and his reign was comparatively
short as was that of his son and successor, Tahutmes IV. His queen
was named Ta-aa and is recorded on a double statue of her and her
son, Tahutmes IV. She is called “royal mother and wife,” showing her
to be his mother. We knew less of her than of almost any of the
queens, that she continued the royal line and her name seems but
brief record of her.
Of Tahutmes IV it is said that he spent much time in youth in
hunting and field sports. He married Mautamua, or Maut-em-va, or
as she is again spoken of, Moutetemarait, possibly an Ethiopian
princess. Various inter-marriages, as in modern times not
unfrequently, making the families in adjacent kingdoms near of kin.
The name of Tahutmes IV is especially associated with the great
Sphinx and we cannot doubt the whole matter was of much interest
to the queen also. The god Harmaehis appeared to the king in a
dream and promised him his special favor if he would dig out the
Sphinx which bore his image and lay half buried in the sand. The
monarch obeyed, restored and repaired the grand monument and
built a temple at its base. This stands between the two extended
paws, on one of which the king’s name has been found inscribed. It
was an open temple with an altar and on the breast of the colossus
was the memorial stone with the king’s name, made of red granite.
Dreams seem to have borne a special art in the family history. The
queen also had a noted dream. It was said that she was sleeping in
the most beautiful room in the palace and awoke and saw her
husband by her side. Then a few moments after the figure of the
god Amen appeared and, when she cried out in alarm, he predicted
the birth of her son and vanished in clouds of sweet perfume. Hence
the young king was considered in a sense the son of the god.
Mautamua is elsewhere called a princess of Mitanni and seems to
have been won with difficulty by the young Egyptian prince or kin.
One of the tablets found says: “When the father of Nimmuriya
(Tahutmes IV) sent to Artotama my grandfather and asked for his
daughter to wife, my grandfather refused his request, and though he
sent the fifth time and the sixth time he would not give her to him.
It was only after he had sent the seventh time that he gave her to
him, being compelled for many reasons.” This was among the noted
collection of the Tel-el-Amarna tablets and is believed by late
authorities to refer to Queen Maut-amua, who is also spoken of as
the divine wife and mother.
The queen’s home was in Thebes, which had succeeded Memphis
as the great city of the Empire, standing, it is said, to Ethiopia and
Egypt “in the relation occupied by Rome to Mediæval Christianity,
the capital sacerdotal city of all who worshipped the god Amen.” On
the wall of what is called the “Birth Room” at the temple of Luxor
are various reliefs relating to the birth of Amenophis III, showing
Queen Maut-a-mua, the nurses, the goddess Isis and others. In one
the Queen, after the birth of her son (Ra-ma-neb), is seen kneeling
on a kind of dais. The goddess Hathor kneels facing her with the
babe in her arms. The Ka of both are repeated, making double
figures, and the sacred cow suckles the child. For some reason, not
given, Amenophis III was particularly rich in Ka names, for he had
seven. Another relief shows Hathor presenting the child to the
goddess Safekh, and to Amen-Ra, the god of Thebes. Behind Amen-
Ra stands the god Nilus and behind him another carrying three
ankhs or life signs for the family, throne and Ka name. Safekh dips
her pen in ink to record his birth; the royal and Ka ovals are
inscribed above. Says Miss Edwards: “Each sovereign on succeeding
to the throne not only assumed a throne name, but took also a
name for his Ka. The throne name was enclosed in a royal oval, or
cartouch, like the family name, but the Ka name was represented as
if inscribed above the false doorway, just where the name of a
deceased person would be inscribed above the actual door of his
sepulchre.”
As the goddess Safekh was the patron deity of libraries we may
judge that the king had intellectual tastes, though we know him to
have been something of an athlete and a great sportsman. Indeed,
it was to this last that he owed his wife, for it was on a hunting
expedition that he encountered and fell in love with her. Queen
Maut-amua and her daughter-in-law, Ti or Thi, were associated
much together, as were Queen Aahotep and her daughter-in-law,
Nefertari-Aahmes, though not so generally considered divinities as
were the founders of the race.
Maut-a-mua must have been a woman of intellect, capacity and
attraction since she was her son’s guardian, and probably regent,
and his attachment to her seems to have been strong and enduring.
She lived many years after her husband, whose reign was brief,
lasting not more than eight or nine years.
 The likenesses of these various kings and queens are often found
among the wall pictures in the tombs and are reproduced in many of
the books on Egypt. The bas-reliefs and statues which decorated
temples and tombs were mostly painted. Says Maspero: “That the
Egyptians studied from Nature is proved by the facility with which
they seized likenesses and drew the appropriate movements of
animals. These figures are strange, but they live and have a certain
charm.” To paint men brown and women yellow was the rule, but to
this there were occasional exceptions. At Sackuarah, in the time of
the Fifth Dynasty, the flesh tint of the men is yellow, while at
Istamboul, or Abu Simbel, it is red, as also in the tombs of the epoch
of Thotmosis IV.
The early Egyptian is said to have had a fine forehead, small,
aquiline nose and a well-formed chin. The picture preserved of
Queen Maut-a-mua, with the royal asp above her forehead, gives a
long, slightly aquiline nose and a small, well-shaped chin. It is rather
startling, in turning to her daughter-in-law, Ti, to find this face
repeated in a sort of caricature, devoid of beauty. As in most cases,
doctors differ as to the amount of reliance that can be placed upon
the verisimilitude of the portraits and statues of these various kings
and queens that have come down to us. Some authorities maintain
that there existed an ideal conventional type, to which the actual
bore little or no resemblance, and point out how each is but the
modification of the other. Some again claim for them considerable
authenticity. Perhaps a middle ground may come nearest to the
truth. The conventional type no doubt dominated the painter’s or
sculptor’s mind. But when the statues are proved to have been
executed in the lifetime of the original it seems likely that some
resemblance was aimed at, and the differences that exist go to show
this. Also in many cases they belonged to the same family, and may
well have had features common to all; as in later times the
Hapsburgh jaw was handed down from generation to generation.
How hard we have found it to reconcile the picture in the various
galleries with the reputation of the charming, beautiful and unhappy
Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, and yet doubtless there was a
resemblance. How often, too, the photograph of a near and dear
friend has an utterly unfamiliar aspect. So that we may fairly admit
that even in these ancient times statues and pictures (at least in
some cases) a suggestion of the original may remain to us.
The head of Tahutmes IV, which is preserved in a statue or
statuette, gives a pleasing face, with an amiable expression. At
Luxor, Queen Maut-a-mua appears without the king, but with her
son, whose paternity is ascribed to Amen. There is also a picture of
the king, smiting some negroes, and behind is a queen called Ai’at
who is spoken of as royal daughter, sister and wife, but it is thought
this may be intended for an ideograph of the “goddess queen,”
Maut-a-mua, as there is no other trace of her. On one private tomb
is a picture of Amenophis III and his mother, and there are also
various small remains in the way of scarabs, rings, etc. In one of the
reliefs in the “Birth Room,” before referred to, the god Amen and the
queen are seated upon the hieroglyphic symbol for heaven and
supported by the goddesses Selqet and Neith.
King Amenophis III did not resemble his mother. It is quite a
different face, with good features and a resolute, though pensive
expression. The forehead is high, the eyes full, the nose long but
rounded at the end, the upper lip short, and the chin prognathous.
He is described as amiable and generous, and showed deference
and strong affection both for mother and wife. He seems among the
most pleasing of the Egyptian kings. Engaged in wars, devoted to
hunting, especially the chase of the lion, which led him far afield, he
was yet, as were many of his predecessors, deeply interested in
architectural enterprises and the era is noted for the spirit and
beauty of its sculpture. Court and colonnade at Karnak were of his
building, and on the walls of various apartments are pictures of the
coronation of the king and other details of his life.
He is best known to us, and his fame rests chiefly on the
marvellous colossi which he erected, “the grandest the world has
ever seen.” They are sixty feet high, and when they wore the crown
of an Egyptian king, which has since been destroyed, towered
seventy feet into the air, a solid block of sandstone. Miss Martineau,
a traveller of comparatively modern times, thus describes the
impression they made upon her. “There they sit, together yet apart,
in the midst of the plain, serene and vigilant, still keeping their
untired watch over the lapse of ages and the eclipse of Europe. I can
never believe that anything else so majestic as this pair has been
conceived of by the imagination of Art, nothing certainly, even in
Nature, ever affected me so unspeakably. The pair, sitting alone
amid the expanse of verdure, with islands of ruins behind them,
grow more striking to us every day. The impression of sublime
tranquility which they convey, when seen from distant points, is
confirmed by a nearer approach. There they sit, keeping watch,
hands on knees, gazing straight forward, seeming, though so much
of the face is gone, to be looking over to the monumental piles on
the other side of the river, which became gorgeous temples after
these throne seats were placed here—the most immovable thrones
that have ever been established on the earth.”
It is rarely that the name of an Egyptian sculptor is preserved, but
this case is an exception. An inscription records his name and his
naturally proud and exultant feelings at the completion of his work.
He was called Amen-hotep or Amen-hept, and thus speaks: “I
immortalized the name of the king and no one has done the like of
me in my works. I executed two portrait statues of the king,
astonishing for their breadth and height, their completed form
dwarfed the temple tower; forty cubits was their measure: they were
cut in the splendid sandstone mountain, on either side the eastern
and the western, I caused to be built lightships whereon the statues
were carried up the river; they were emplaced in their sublime
temple; they will last as long as heaven. A joyful event was it when
they were landed at Thebes and raised up in their place.”
The stone is of a yellowish brown color and very difficult to work.
Both statues represent the king and stood before a temple which he
built, but of which the veriest fragments remain. We are reminded
somewhat by the sculptor’s triumphant pæan of the good Un’e, who
was minister to Pepi VI and so exulted in his work and position. Fond
as Amenophis was of both his mother and his foreign wife, for
whose pleasure and diversion he constructed a great lake, neither of
them sit beside him or share the honor of so majestic a statue, as
we might suppose, especially as regards his wife, would have been
the case; he immortalizes himself alone. Two figures of queens,
Maut-a-mua and Ti, are, however sculptured at the base of the
statues; they measure eighteen feet in height, but appear small
beside the colossi. Says one visitor, the surface of the statues was
originally beautifully polished. The thrones on which they are seated
are covered with sculptures; the god Hapi (the Nile) is weaving
together the lotus lily and papyrus plant, implying the rule of the
monarch over Upper and Lower Egypt.
Homer calls Amenophis III, the Memnon of the Greeks, “the most
stately of living men,” and according to a later legend he was the
son of Aurora. It was during the Roman imperial epoch that they
were taken for the statues of Memnon, who slew Nestor’s son,
Antiochus, in the Trojan war, and was himself slain by Achilles, and
to explain the fact that the Trojan hero should thus appear in Egypt
a legend was invented. The so-called “vocal Memnon,” the more
Eastern of the statues, greeted his mother, Eos, with musical sounds
and the morning dews were supposed to be the tears which the
goddess shed upon her beloved child. The two statues stood at the
end of an avenue of gigantic figures, leading to the temple of Amen,
and from the river to the temple, a mile in length, went the Strada
Regia, the royal street of Thebes.
Says our own Curtis, who has written so charmingly of his
Egyptian experiences: “Yearly comes the Nile humbly to his feet, and
leaving them pays homage. Then receding slowly leaves water
plants wreathed around the throne, on which he is sculptured as a
good genius harvesting the lotus, and brings a hundred travellers to
perpetuate the homage. These sublime sketches in stone are an
artist’s work. In those earlier days Art was not content with the
grace of Nature, but coped with its proportions. Vain attempts, but
glorious!” The fact of this musical note being heard from “the darling
of the dawn” is recorded on the base of the statue, and is mentioned
by Strabo, the elder Pliny and many others. Sandy beaches
sometimes emit musical sounds and something in the structure of
the rock, warmed by the rays of the rising sun, may have caused the
sounds to be heard, or they may have been produced by artificial
means, at the instance of the priests, striving to impress the people.
The true origin of the mystery was never discovered, though its
existence seems well attested, and eventually the sounds ceased,
probably as the result of an earthquake or the restoration of the
figures which was undertaken by a later king. Another theory lays
the injury of the statues at the door of Cambyses, who was credited
with all possible crimes, and a sculptured inscription reads: “I wrote
after having heard Memnon. Cambyses has wounded me. A stone
cut into the image of the sun-king. I had once the sweet voice of
Memnon, but Cambyses has deprived me of the accents which
express joy and grief.”
The sounds are said by some authorities to have been heard
during a period of two hundred and twenty years. Travellers in
ancient times (like the modern vandal) were very fond of scribbling
their names on monuments, which should be held in more respect,
and a number of these, including some of their remarks and silly
verses, have been found on the base of the statue and refer to the
sounds. At the time of their erection the level of the Nile was
evidently different from that of the present day for its waters, as
Curtis has said, now occasionally leave the feet of the giant pair.
Amenophis III began quarrying stone for his numerous
architectural works in the first and second years of his reign from
quarries near Silseleh, and his palace was said to resemble that
subsequently built by his son at Tel-el-Amarna in some respects.
Scarabs bearing the name of this king are to be seen in our own
New York Museum, as also in various other places, but those of
Tahutmes III are still more frequent here. The tomb of Amenophis
III was found in the west valley of the Tombs of the Kings by a
French expedition.
 Queen Maut-a-mua had the pleasure, we may believe, of seeing a
number of grandchildren, as Amenophis III had four sons and three
daughters, if not others unmentioned, and so kindly seem to have
been the family relations that we may perhaps picture her with her
son’s wife in the midst of the home circle spoiling them quite like a
modern grandmother. Up to this period the men of the family appear
to have been a stalwart, good-looking race, while the women
probably possessed more beauty than their pictures would lead us to
infer. Of the general outline of their history we have some
knowledge, but seldom or never can we definitely place the day of
their birth or that of their death. So at what exact period Queen
Maut-a-mua passed away we cannot state, only we may believe she
was watched over by filial affection to the last, was buried amid
tears and lamentations, and had all due funeral rites observed, even
if she was not numbered among those royalties who were specially
regarded as divinities, the founders of the race, and to whom divine
honors were subsequently paid, yet is she occasionally spoken of as
“the goddess queen.”
 CHAPTER ELEVENTH.
TYI.

With Queen Tyi (or as her name is variously spelled, Ti, Tai, Tity,
Tii, Teye, Tuaa, Thua) we again consider the story of a woman of
unusual power, and though not leaving such indelible impression
upon the page of history as did Queen Hatasu, her influence was
strongly felt. Both as wife and mother we see the traces of her ideas
and wishes on the actions of husband and son; both, evidently,
turned to her for counsel and each in his own way showed her
devoted affection. So potent was her sway over the latter that to it is
largely attributed the religious and political revolution which occurred
in the lifetime of Amenophis IV. Though its effects were
comparatively temporary and passed away during the reign of his
successors for the time being it convulsed Egypt to its centre and
the records of it have not been obliterated by the lapse of centuries.
Amenophis III, son of Tahutmes IV and Maut-a-mua, was, we
judge, an attractive youth. He had a fine presence, an agreeable
expression and an amiable and generous disposition, while his love
story holds more of romance than usually falls to the lot of kings or
queens. He is credited with a number of wives or less reputable
connections. Perhaps they included the errors of the “sowing of wild
oats,” and at any rate seem to have been relegated to or kept in the
background by a devoted affection for the lady who became pre-
eminently his legal wife. These various wives are given as a sister
and two daughters of Kalima-Sin, King of Karaduniyash, and a sister
and daughter of Tushratta, King of Mittani, none of whom, it is said,
were acknowledged queen of Egypt, while other records seem to
imply that Queen Tyi was the daughter of Tushratta of Dushratta,
King of Mittanni. A letter to Babylon seems to show that Amenophis
III had married a Babylonish princess, and that her brother, Kali-
masin, was not satisfied about her safety, but was reassured by
Amenophis. A match between another princess of that country and
the Egyptian sovereign seems to have failed for lack of sufficient
gold on the lady’s part. Wars also interfered with connubial
arrangements.
Another account says that Amenophis III haughtily refused when
the King of Mesopotamia, Kalima-Sin, wished to marry one of the
Egyptian princesses, saying that the daughter of the king of the
Land of Egypt had never been given to a “nobody.” This, of course,
occurred later, if at all, and it seems not quite reasonable that the
king himself should take a princess as his wife from the same family
to which he refused his daughter. The sovereign of great Egypt
evidently viewed with contempt the claims of these petty princes to
be considered in any way his equal. Yet one letter in the collection
found at Tel-el-Amarna shows that Tahutmes III, Tahutmes IV and
Amenophis IV all married Mitannian princesses. After such a lapse of
time and among conflicting statements it is hard to arrive at the
absolute facts, but as our present concern is chiefly with Queen Tyi it
matters the less. She alone of these various ladies has a distinct
personality and takes a prominent place.
Hunting was, with Amenophis III, a passion, the hunting of the
lion a royal sport, for the sake of which he journeyed far and no
doubt underwent many enforced privations. It must have been in the
heyday of youth and manly vigor that, on one of his long
expeditions, he encountered the foreign princess who at once won
his heart and probably reciprocated to a more than ordinary degree
the affection she inspired. Spite of the rather unattractive effigies
which bear her name, we must believe that she was beautiful and
winning, since for her sake he cast aside the so frequent custom of
marriage with a sister or some home dignitary and invited her to
share his throne.
Probably then, or later, the queen participated in the favorite
amusement of her husband, not wanting in courage for the perils or
hardships involved, nor did she shrink as a more sensitive female of
later times might have done from what was painful, cruel or
revolting in the death throes of the mighty beast.
Scarabs, so often used by the Egyptians to record events which
they considered of importance, have been found, bearing such
inscriptions as this: “Amenhotep, prince of Thebes, giver of life, and
royal spouse Thi. In respect of lions, brought Majesty his from
shooting his own, beginning from year first to year tenth, lions fierce
102.”
These scarabs, giving the names of gods, kings and singers are
often most valuable in filling gaps in other records. The most
frequently found are those of Tahutmes III, of which there are a
number in the Metropolitan Museum in New York; Amenophis III,
Seti I and Rameses II, and they are inscribed with the names of
kings from Mena to the Roman Emperor Antoninus. Hence on those
known to be of a particular period and found with the royal
mummies, the name of much earlier kings are frequently traced.
Scarabs were copied by the Phoenicians and are imitated in these
modern times in Egypt. The work, at first very clumsy, has gradually
become better executed, while the real ones have, of course, grown
dearer as well as rarer.
A brief enumeration of some of the scarabs relating to these
periods to be seen in the New York Museum may not be without
interest. One of Tahutmes or Thothmes III has the figure of the god
Bes in the centre, flanked by cartouches of the king a winged scarab
below and obscure ornamentation above. The color of the
composition of which it is made a faded reddish brown. Another of
soft blue stone or paste has the pre-nomen of the same king called
“subduer of foreigners in all lands.” One of green porcelain,
beautifully executed, shows a squatting figure with extended arms,
upholding the divine boat, and above, the pre-nomen of King
Thothmes. Inscriptions are “the good god” and “lord of both lands,”
while the ankh, or life sign, is both behind the body and attached to
the knees. On another of grey composition, above a horse, chariot
and charioteer, is the pre-nomen of the king, in a cartouch, with the
ends reversed. A bead or seal of hard, green stone has on the one
side the pre-nomen of Thothmes III, with the Tet sign below, each
flanked by uraei, and on the reverse a Hathor-headed sistrum also
flanked by uraei. A cartouch of Amenophis III and the symbol of
“truth” is on a scarab of green and brown pottery. Another has
“Praise of Amenophis III.” His cartouch and “lord of might” is on one
of green pottery, while a scarab in grey composition, beautifully
executed bears the pre-nomen of the king on both sides, with a
winged beetle and disk flanked by uraei and a human headed sphinx
with the words, “Living god Tum.” Most interesting of all, however, in
connection with the present chapter, is a green pottery scaraboid,
symbolic eye, bearing the words “The royal wife Tii,” wife of
Amenohotep III.
Melville has graphically described the setting forth of a royal hunt,
in another ancient kingdom, which, in some particulars at least, may
reproduce the Egyptian pageant. “A queen and all her glittering train
defiled from the lofty porches of Babylon the Great, with tramp of
horses and ring of bridle, with steady footfalls of warriors, curled,
bearded, erect and formidable, with ponderous tread of stately
elephants, gorgeous in trappings of scarlet, pearl and gold, with
stealthy gait of meek-eyed camels, plodding patient with their
burdens in the rear. Scouring into the waste before that jewelled
troop of wild asses bruised and broke the shoots of wormwood
beneath their flying hoofs, till the hot air was laden with an aromatic
smell, the ostrich spread her scant and tufted wings to scud before
the wind, tall, swift, ungainly, in a cloud of yellow dust; the fleet
gazelle, with beating heart and head, tucked back, sprang forward
like an arrow from the bow, never to pause nor stint in her terror-
stricken flight, till man and horse, game and hunter were left
hopelessly behind—far down beyond the unbroken level of the
horizon. But the monarch of the desert, the grim and lordly lion,
sought no refuge in flight, accepted no compromise of retreat.
Driven from his covert he might move slowly and sullenly away, but
it was to turn in savage wrath on the eager horseman who
approached too near, or the daring archer who ventured to bend his
bow within point-blank distance of such an enemy. Nevertheless,
even the fiercest of their kind must yield before man, the conqueror
of beasts, before woman, the conqueror of man, and on the shaft
which drank his life blood and transfixed the lion from side to side
was graven the royal tiara of a monarch’s mate.”
Amid such scenes sped the wooing, and no doubt in later years
passed many exciting hours. Amenophis or Amenhotep III reared
young lions as pets, and also presented live ones as gifts to the
temples, estimating them as of great value, though we may wonder
in what special manner they could be of profit, service or pleasure
there.
The pictures of Queen Tyi, or Tai, in the tombs of the Queens,
near Thebes, and in other places, copied by Champollion and
Rosellini show her with blue eyes, a skin of pinkish hue, like a
Northern maiden, and a pleasing expression. Many of the queens
were buried in a valley behind the temple of Medinet Haboo at
Thebes others were laid beside their lords. Tyi, as has been said,
was considered by some to be the daughter of a Mesopotamian,
Asiatic, Dashratta or Tushratta, king of Mitanni, Maten of the
hieroglyphics. Other authorities, from cuneiform tablets found at Tel-
el-amarna, give her paternity as that of a sister of or daughter of
Kalimma Sin, king of Koraduniyash, probably a county northeast of
Syria. Kings and queens of Babylon claimed Amenophis III as a new
kinsman, perhaps as the result of this marriage.
Scarabs were engraved in honor of the union and part of a scarab
gives the record “Amenhetep, prince of Thebes, giver of life and
royal spouse mighty lady Thi, living one—the name of father her
(was) Tuaa or Juaa, the name of mother her (was) Thuau, the wife
to wit of the king powerful. Frontier his South is as far as Kerei, land
of Nubia, frontier North is as far as Netharina (Mesopotamia).” Part
of another reads, “A wonderful thing they brought to Majesty his,
life, strength, health, the daughter of the prince of Mesopotamia,
Sotharna. Kirkipa and the chiefs of women her 300 + 10 + 7.” The
mummies of her parents have been recently found.
 Many of these scarabs are preserved in the Museums of Gizeh,
Berlin and other places. An enamelled vase in different colors in the
Gizeh Museum also bears the name of Amenophis III and Tyi, a
potsherd, in one of the older museums gives the coronation date of
Amenophis III as “the 13th day of the month Epiphi,” said to
correspond in part to our April and May, which, without this
otherwise valueless fragment we might perhaps never have known.
Queen Tyi was attended as the scarab notes, by three hundred
and seventeen women, which would of course imply a force of male
protectors as well. A very precious bride. This may recall the story in
the Talmud about Abraham, who on approaching Egypt locked Sarah
in a chest to hide her dangerous beauty. The custom officers asked if
he carried clothes. He answered, “I will pay for clothes.” Then they
raised their demand, “Thou carriest gold?” To this he also agreed
and further to the price of the finest silks and precious stones.
Finding they could name nothing of greater value than he held his
treasure they at last insisted that he should open the box and the
tale ends “the whole of Egypt was illuminated with the lustre of
Sarah’s beauty.” Whether Queen Tyi’s beauty thus surprised and
delighted the people of her new home we can only surmise, but at
least she was deemed precious enough to be well served and
guarded.
So the bond was sealed between the royal lovers and away from
her own land journeyed the newly elected queen. A woman with a
fair face and figure, a heart keenly responsive to human affections,
with a deep-seated faith in the religion of her fore-fathers,
worshippers of the sun, and, perhaps even at that early period, a
quiet determination that she would win her husband and his people
from what she must have deemed the error of their ways, their
worship of so many gods under the form of beasts and birds,
introduce a purer, simpler religion among them. Something of the
spirit of Joan of Arc may have animated her; something of the
religious fervor of an Ursula and her eleven thousand virgins (or was
it only eleven martyrs, the M being mistaken for a thousand?) as the
one girded herself for battle and the other took up her pious
pilgrimage.
We know less of the formalities necessary for the conclusion of a
royal marriage among the Egyptians than we do of their funeral rites
and ceremonies. The latter as ushering them into a new and higher
existence were deemed the more important and of greater concern
to both the present generation and to posterity, especially the latter,
and its records and momentoes tell the story a thousand times, but
we may take for granted that many observances, both civil and
religious, marked the union of man and woman, in particular those
of nobles and kings. Some authorities have questioned Queen Tyi’s
claim to royal birth, but the retinue of attendants and servants that
accompanied her leave little doubt that she was a princess of note.
This bridal train may recall another of later times, that of Henrietta
Maria of France, as she journeyed to meet her future husband,
Charles I of England. She, too, was attended by a large retinue: she,
too, held strongly a different faith and more or less, on that account,
awakened the prejudices of her new subjects, and she, too, was
involved in a revolution, partly religious in character. But here the
parallel ends, for the one remained in possession of her power, while
the other was driven from her throne and became an exile.
Perhaps the new queen was taken at once to her palace, the
remains of which were discovered by Greaut at Malgata, and which,
after being pillaged, were subsequently excavated by Newberry and
Titus. Or she may have watched its erection with interest, after her
arrival. The original edifice is thus described by those who have
made a careful study of the fragmentary remains. “The plan of the
palace seems to have been quite similar to that of the palace which
Amenophis IV erected for himself in Tel-el-Amarna, and which was
several years ago explored by Petrie. In the palace of Amenophis III
the rooms were likewise adorned by beautifully decorated stucco
floors, and the roof were supported by columns. The walls were
embellished with stucco work, the representations, in part, setting
forth every-day life. In addition to staterooms, working rooms, the
kitchen with its storage closets, a faience factory, in which the
different amulets and ornaments were made, can be distinguished.
Not far from the palace was found an altar, built of tile, and at one
time probably wainscotted with slabs of stone. It was quite similar to
the one in the temple of Deir-el-Bahri, and this one was certainly
dedicated to the sun-god. As the altars of ancient Israel most likely
also had a similar form, these remains of the old Egyptian cultus
have an especial Biblical interest.” The columns of the great temple
and likely of the palace also, were sculptured to resemble the buds
of the lotus, sometimes called the Egyptian immortelle, which might
also be called the national flower, so highly was it regarded and so
constantly was it used as a model for architectural designs.
That the foreign daughter-in-law was kindly received by Queen
Maut-a-mua we may well believe from the harmony which seemed
to exist between them later and the union of their two statues with
that of Amenophis III; while in her turn Queen Tyi, when she
occupied the same position, extended a like friendly affection to her
son’s wife.
The influence of the new queen was soon perceived in the
institution, by the king, of a religious festival in honor of the sun’s
disk. Many of the people may have been charmed to have anything
like another holiday, with its attendant pageants and observances,
added to their list, but there can be little doubt that it awakened the
suspicion of the priests, who jealously guarded the ancient faith and
beheld with disfavor anything that might involve less devotion to the
numerous gods which they worshipped and of whose interests they
were the guardians, and any change that might minimize their
influence or deplete the resources in the treasuries of the temples.
Queen Tyi seems not to have been popular. She was a foreigner,
which in itself often awakens an antagonistic feeling, amusingly
illustrated in the story of the English laborer who when told that a
passer by was a stranger exclaimed, “Eave alf a brick at im’.” She
held a different faith and in all probability the priests with a
consciousness of her latent or expressed views and principles used
their great influence quietly to set the people against her and this
dislike was transferred to her son.
But to her husband she was ever a first consideration. The records
give an account of an enterprise which he early undertook for her
pleasure. This was the construction of a large artificial lake on which
she might sail or row at will. Again the scarabs chronicle this tribute
of connubial tenderness, and again we see the queen’s religious
views considered. It begins as usual with an ascription to the gods.
“Under the majesty of Horus the golden, mighty of valor, full power,
diademed with law (lord of the North and South) establisher of laws,
pacifier of the two lands. Horus, the golden, mighty of valor, smiter
of foreign lands. Ordered majesty his the oaking of a lake for the
royal spouse, mighty lady Thi. Length its (was) cubits 3000-6000,
breadth its cubits 600. Made majesty his festival of the entrance of
the waters on month third of sowing day sixteenth. Sailed majesty in
his boat ‘Atenneferu’ ‘Disk of beauties’ or ‘the most beautiful disk.’”
He sailed across to inaugurate the opening and perhaps to show her
that all was safe and well and then doubtless the queen held sway
over it, permitting only such as she chose to share the pleasure with
her and perhaps making it a mark of special favor when she did so.
The Egyptians held many of their religious festivals on the Nile and
this lake may have been specially devoted to such religious
observances as the queen wished to hold in honor of the celestial
god whom she worshipped. The place selected for this feat of
engineering skill was near the town of Tarucha.
The remains of a beautiful temple at Sideruga, built by Amenophis
III to or for Queen Tyi, have also been found and an inscription says
Amenhotep “made his monuments for the great and mighty heiress,
the mistress of all lands, Tyi.” A group of the king and Tyi is in the
Summa collection and an inscription reads: “Amen’nekht, princess,
prays with her mother before Amenhotep III, because he praises her
beautiful face and honors her beauty.” A Usheti box in the Berlin
Museum bears the name of Tyi and the monuments of her are
numerous. She is by the colossi of her husband and appears with
him in official scenes at Saleb. The figure sculptured in the tomb of
Huy at Tel-el-Amarna, on a scarab, etc., is shown seated; her name
alone appears in a quarry at the same place, after her husband’s
death. And her parents are named as Yoman and Thuaa.
The additions made by Amenophis III to the long list of Egyptian
temples are among the most noted. He built the oldest part of the
Serapeum at Sakkarah, the temple of Amen-Ra at Karnak and also at
Luxor a sanctuary with surrounding chambers, a pro-naos or hall
with four columns, and another large court (which was evidently
used afterwards as a place of worship by the early Christians), and a
noble hypostycle court with four rows of lofty columns bearing the
lotus capital. At the end nearest the sanctuary on either side are
double rows of the same columns, then a huge pilon, and in front of
all, a noble avenue of fourteen still more massive and lofty columns
bearing the lotus-flower capital. This avenue with the usual pylon
appears to have completed the Temple of Amenophis III. About
1600 B. C. is the date sometimes set for this work. An avenue of
Sphinxes connected the two temples. The temple of Mut at Karnak
was Amenophis’ special work. At el Kab there is also a beautiful little
temple or chapel built by him containing various pictures of the king
making offerings to the gods, etc. Other works might be named as
well as the grand statues already referred to.
As devoted as was Amenophis III to the god Amen, on whose
temples he lavished gifts and to whom he paid special honors, so
antagonistic was his son and successor to the same deity. May it
chance that as the mother taught and impressed upon the youthful
minds of her children her own religious ideas, so the father
especially in the case of this son, forced them to acts of worship to
the many gods of Egypt which revolted them and in the end served
only to drive them the further from the old faith. Such is the
perversity of human nature that the very means taken to win assent
to any proposition or principle are often those which have most
influence in causing the pendulum of thought and opinion to swing
to the opposite extreme.
 It is said that the striking change in the physiognomy and ideal
type of the upper classes in the latter part of the Eighteenth Dynasty
points to strong foreign infusion. The bold, active faces of earlier
times are replaced by sweetness and delicacy, a gentle smile and
small, gracefully curved nose, this is characteristic of the time of
Amenophis III.
The life of King Amenophis was an active one, less warlike than
most of his predecessors, but leaving behind many memorials. It is
possible that his long and doubtless exposing hunting expeditions
may have had a bad effect upon him, for it was still in his prime
probably that his life ended and his wife seems long to have survived
him. His reign, however, covers a lengthy period, thirty-six years, but
he, owing to his father’s early death, ascended the throne in youth.
So, in the quaint and beautiful language of Scripture, Amenophis III
“slept with his fathers,” and Amenophis IV reigned in his stead.
The tomb of Amenophis III, discovered by the French Expedition,
is in the West Valley of the Tombs of the Kings. Here also his father
and many other Egyptian sovereigns were buried. On the rocky walls
are representations of the king and the gods, some of which were
only partially completed. Amenophis III stands out an attractive
personality among the long list of Egyptian kings. We cannot doubt
that he was mourned by many, especially by the love of his youth
and later years, Queen Tyi. Henceforth her life was bound up with
that of her eldest son. She and Amenophis III had, some say two,
some say four sons, and four or five daughters. The eldest son, who
changed his name, was first called Amenophis IV and his next
brother, Tahutmes, after the grandfather or other ancestor of that
name. The daughters were Isis, Heot-mi-hib Satamon, of whom
some memorials remain, and some say Beckaten, youngest and
favorite, but who is elsewhere termed grand-daughter, rather than
daughter, of Tyi.
That Queen Tyi was a faithful mother whose affectionate heart
clung to her children as she had been a loving and devoted wife we
cannot doubt. But her eldest son, the champion of her faith, the
earnest disciple of her teachings, which had sunk into his heart and
borne abundant fruit, must have been especially beloved. With him
her after history is closely associated, and her influence is shown
even more strongly than during the life of her husband and there is
little question that to it is largely due the subsequent course of
events. Amenophis III had deferred to her wishes and shown special
marks of favor to her religious views, but her son accepted them
with his whole heart and spent his life in trying to make them the
religion of his native land.
 CHAPTER TWELFTH.
TYI (CONTINUED).

As the reign and influence of Queen Hatasu or Hatshepsut

included, in part as those of her father and two brothers, so did that
of Queen Tyi those of husband and son. The fair young girl who had
left her own country with high hopes and aspirations had crystallized
into the determined woman, who bent all the energies of a strong
nature to the accomplishment of her wishes and purposes. The
religion of her fore-fathers was no longer kept in the background.
She inspired her son with the zeal of an apostle or a fanatic, as we
may choose to consider it, and the king devoted his life to upturning
the old order of things and an endeavor to establish the new. His
father had shown much deference to his wife’s religious faith. In the
new festival, instituted in his honor, that of the Solar Disk, on the
16th of Athyr (October 4th), a prominent place had been assigned in
the procession to the boat of the sun “Aten-ne-fru.” He also put the
disk on the head of his crlo-sphinxes and on the statues of the
goddesses Pasht and Sekhet; but all this was, in a measure,
tentative.
It remained for Amenophis IV, who was by early writers numbered
among the Stranger kings, till his true paternity was discovered and
now styled himself “Akhenaten” of “Khu-n-aten,” Worshipper of the
(Sun’s Disk) to proclaim openly his mother’s faith. It has been
suggested that his aim was to provide a god visible to all the people
of his extensive empire, and who could be worshipped in common
by all, or jealousy between the priests of Heliopolis and those of
Thebes may have been another ingredient in the mixed and vexed
problem. Beside his father’s great temple at Luxor he erected a
sanctuary of the sun, and in various places the name of Amon was
obliterated.
 Whatever the subsequent history of Queen Tyi’s other children, it
was to the eldest son that the mother evidently clung, and we may
perhaps believe that he, chiefly of them all, shared her views and
opinions. On slips from toilette boxes, etc., are found the names of
the princesses Sat-amen, Hent-mer-hab and Ast; there was also a
son, with the family name of Tahutmes. Bekaten is by some believed
to be the youngest and favorite daughter of Tyi, by others to be her
grand-daughter, the child of Amenophis IV, who is thought to have
married before his father’s death. At Somma is a group of the king
and Tyi. At Qurneh a funeral temple north of Ramesseum,
rearranged by Amenhotep III for his daughter Sit-amen, which
proves that this child, at least, died before the father. Another
inscription read, “Amen’nekht, princess, prays with her mother,
before Amenhotep III, because he praises her beautiful face and
honors her beauty.” Some of the children probably died young, some
may have married and gone elsewhere, but the eldest, the father’s
successor, had both the will and the power to plant the new faith,
and with him Queen Tyi’s later life seems closely associated.
As the character of this prince has afforded historians much
ground for speculation, so do the presentments that remain of him.
No cartoon in Punch could more ludicrously caricature the human
face than do the pictures that are preserved of King Khu-n-aten. Yet
in their ghastly ugliness they still retain the conventional type. Many
writers seem to consider them as reliable as other likenesses, and
attribute the protruding lips and attenuated mis-shapen proportions
to heredity, some ancestor of negro blood, or the results of ill health.
Others offer no explanation. It seems impossible that any reigning
king (and in no period of Egyptian history does the monarch appear
to be more autocratic than at this time) should have permitted such
portraits of himself to remain to posterity. He was the son of
handsome parents. It is possible that the conventional type was
considered so beautiful that no deviation which yet preserved the
general outline could mar it? Or perchance is there another solution.
The king forced upon the country a religion abhorrent to the priests,
to the majority of the people, and to his successors, who soon
returned to the polytheistic faith and worship of earlier centuries,
and who might well have taken pleasure in caricaturing and handing
down to their descendants a garbled picture of the hated monarch,
iconoclast as he seemed to them, reformer as he doubtless
appeared in the eyes of his mother and all the converts to the
worship of the sun. The slanting forehead, the long thin nose, the
protruding, flexible mouth, the serpent-like neck and the ungainly
proportions of the figure are little calculated to attract admiration.
A parallel to this might perhaps be found in the case of Richard III
of England, who, as he was a monster of wickedness, must needs be
a monster of ugliness as well, and whose personal defects have
been exaggerated by limner and scribe until his traditional
semblance is that of a dwarfish fiend.
Says Curtis, “the old Egyptian artist was as sure of his hand and
eye as the French artist who cut his pupil’s paper with his thumb nail
to indicate that the line should run so and not otherwise. The
coloring is rude and inexpressive, the drawing of the human figure
conventional, for the church or the priests ordained how the human
form should be drawn. Later the church and priests ordained how
the human form should be governed. Yet, O sumptuous scarlet
queen sitting on seven hills, you were generous to art, while you
were wronging nature.”
Khu-n-aten or Akhenaten married, however, and probably in
youth, as he was the father of quite a large family. His wife is spoken
of as the daughter of Dushratta and may have been the grand-
daughter of an Egyptian king, her mother having married a Syrian
prince. Dushratta, writing to Queen Tyi, before Amenophis IV took
up affairs, greets Tadekhipa, his daughter, Tyi’s daughter-in-law. As
seems to have been the custom, she changed her name on coming
to Egypt and is known as Aten’neferu,’ Nefertiti, or Nefertity. She was
always closely associated with the king and there seems no mention
of other wives or connections of any kind. She doubtless shared or
was a convert to his faith and we may judge its enthusiastic
supporter.
 Queen Tyi appears to have remained in Thebes while the king and
his wife went to superintend the building of the temple, palaces,
etc., of the new city which Khu-n-aten had resolved to build and
make his royal residence. Angry blood rose between him, his priests
and his people, but he was dictator, he would no longer dwell among
them, but in a new and richly adorned city, worthy of the faith which
he held, and whose building should equal or surpass older
monuments. He issued a command to obliterate from the tombs of
his ancestors the names of the god Amon and the goddess Mut. This
fanned the smouldering discontent into flames and open rebellion
broke out. Against Amon the king seemed to hold a particular spite,
and around the shrine of this god priests and followers mustered
their forces.
But although the king abandoned Thebes, he retained his power
and was not overthrown. No council of priests or people brought him
to trial, sent him into exile, or took his life. Nor in turn does he seem
to have been severe or vengeful. No records remain, as is frequently
the case in such instances, of barbarous punishments or cruel
executions being meted out to the offenders. For the time being, if
for that only, he was absolute and carried his point. He could afford
to be generous.
The new capital was distant from both Memphis and Thebes, in
middle Egypt, and received the name of Khu-a-ten, or as it is
elsewhere given, Khuteteyn, “the horizon of the sun,” the modern
Tel-el-Amarna or El-Amarna, the extensive ruins of which may yet be
seen on both banks of the Nile. Like Solomon in Scripture, the
potentate summoned to his assistance both artists and artizans, and
the work was pressed with all possible vigor and speed. First the
temple, then the palaces and homes of the nobility, lastly, in the
neighborhood, their tombs. It is said that a revolution in art
proceeded side by side with that in religion, an attempt was made to
discard the older traditions and approximate more nearly to nature,
and the specimen of these attempts at realism, to be found in the
tombs, are of great interest. To this fact some authorities attribute
the singular and disagreeable portraits of the king before referred to.
 How deeply Queen Tyi’s heart was stirred and how keenly her
feelings were concerned we may well conceive. The great enterprise
was the development of her heart’s desire and every aid in her
power she must have lent to the king’s assistance. Remaining in the
old city she could no doubt expedite the sending of all sorts of
supplies and materials required for the buildings and the private
needs of her beloved son and his family.
Architecture and sculpture were ever important in the eyes of the
Egyptian kings, and even the queens had their own sculptors and
overseers of such work. Timber was scarce, quarries of sandstone
and limestone numerous, hence the more enduring was the
commoner material, which has preserved to posterity much that,
had the ancient world been constructed of our more perishable
wood and brick, in all probability would have utterly passed away.
Some of the temples, as many of the tombs, of which those at Beni
Hassan are an example, were in grottoes and caves, others stood
alone in majestic grandeur; in all columns were used and the lotus
was the prevailing ornament. Says Kendric, “As the columns of Beni
Hassan gave rise to the Doric, so those which imitate plants and
flowers appear to be the origin of the Corinthian. The Ionian volute
is found in the columns of Persepolis, but in no Egyptian monument.
It was probably of Assyrian origin, as it has been found in the
remains of Nineveh.”
An inscription at Telel-Amarna reads, “And for the first time the
king gave the command to call together all the masons from the
Island of Elephantine to the town of Samud (special name for Migdol
in Lower Egypt) and the chiefs and the leaders of the people to open
a great quarry of the hard stone for the erection of the great obelisk
of Har-makhu, by his name, as the god of light, who is (worshipped)
as the sun’s disk in Thebes. Thither came the great and noble lords
and the chief of the fan-bearers, to superintend the cutting and
shipping of the stone.” Brugsch tells us that the stone quarry of
Assoan and the cliffs of Silsilis on each side of the river furnished,
the former rose and black granite, and the latter hard brown
sandstone for this work. He also thinks that King Khu-n-aten
designed to build in Thebes a gigantic pyramid of this same stone to
the honor of his god.
Not far from the Nile, in the new city, rose the great temple of the
sun. It was on a wide plain, the mountains rising behind it as says
the same author, “like an encompassing wall.” The king also
bestowed great honor upon his chief overseers and helpers, who
accepted the new faith and entered into the work with real or
assumed enthusiasm.
One named Meri-ra or Mery-Re “dear to the sun” was high-priest
or prophet, the Pharaoh bestowing upon him words of praise and
commendation and investing him with that special kingly reward, a
golden necklace. His tomb at Tel el Amarna is one of the most
interesting and largest that have been found. It is supported by
columns and on its walls are depicted many scenes giving portraits
of the deceased and his wife, the king and queen making offerings
to the sun, the princesses and others. And it is here that is found the
picture of the bestowal of the golden necklace.
A certain Aahmes, one of the many, for this seems long to have
been a favorite name in Egypt, was another highly valued assistant
and among the sepulchral inscriptions found at Tel-el-Amarna was a
prayer to the son written by him. Beginning with ascription, it reads,
“Beautiful is thy setting thou son’s disk of life, thou lord of lords and
king of worlds,” and ending with professions of devotion to the king,
as his “divine benefactor,” who had raised him to greatness, which
naturally perhaps appears to have produced a very pleasing state of
mind, for he concludes “the servant of the prince rejoices and is in a
festive disposition every day.”
At this time there were at least several grandchildren of Queen
Tyi, as special houses were prepared for them in connection with the
palace. We can therefore imagine the impatience with which the
dowager queen awaited the time for her journey to the new city and
rejoining her loved ones, and couriers were doubtless busy, passing
back and forth, with orders and directions from the king, as well as
messages of affection to his mother, which were returned in full
measure. It seems almost as if it might be at his special desire that
she remained in Thebes, to lend him, as before said, all the aid in
her power towards the completion of his work and that he might
have the satisfaction of welcoming her to his new capital in a nearly
completed state. She may also have acted to some extent as regent
in his absence.
Her time of anticipation therefore must have endured for some
years, since the erection of buildings of such magnitude could not
have been accomplished in a very short period, no matter what the
expedition used for the purpose. This second journey may well have
reminded Queen Tyi of an earlier one she had taken in her youth,
from her far native land, as the wife or the affianced bride of
Amenophis III. That had been the seed-time, the sowing of which
had produced such great fruits. Again she went forward attended by
a large retinue, but now it was not to a land of promise, but one of
fulfilment.
The king and his wife met the dowager queen after their long
separation with all honor and affection, and themselves conducted
her into the new temple. A picture of this scene, which remains, is
thus inscribed, “Introduction of the queen mother to behold her sun
shadow,” and very happy she must have felt in thus viewing the
visible tokens of the realization of the dreams, hopes and prayers of
many years. She must inspect the temple, the palaces of the king,
queen and the various princesses, as well as the dwelling prepared
for herself, and no doubt be made acquainted with the chief
overseers and artists whom “the king delighted to honor,” and under
whose charge the work had so prospered. The private houses were
probably varied in color and frequently decorated on the outside
with pictures of the occupations or professions of the owners.
Beyond, some such scene as this, an immense meadow cut through
with a blue stream, north and south, white walls of towns, on the
horizons rim the reddish sands of the desert. The myth they believed
in was this, “Osiris fell in love with this strip of land in the midst of
deserts. He covered it with plants and living creatures, so as to have
from them profit. Then the kindly god took a human form and
became the first pharaoh. When he felt that his body was withering
he left it and entered into his son and later into his son’s son. The
lord has extended like a mighty tree. All the pharaohs are his roots,
the nomarks and priests his larger branches, the nobles the smaller
branches. The visible god sits on the throne of the earth and
receives the income which belongs to him from Egypt; the invisible
god receives offerings in his temples and declares his will through
the lips of the priesthood.”
It was a joyful reunion, this of the elder queen with her son and
his family, an occasion never to be forgotten in their domestic
annals, and we may imagine how the story was handed down from
generation to generation. The day when grandmother, or great-
grandmother came and saw the new temple and new city. Loved and
honored Queen Tyi probably settled down with or near her son and
his wife, enjoying to the full the kindly family life and seeing as had
her mother-in-law before her the grandchildren gather around.
Perhaps she regretted that no son was born to succeed his father,
for King Khu-n-aten had daughters only, but her life had been a full
and happy one and she had enjoyed the blessing, accorded to but
few, of seeing her heart’s dearest wishes fulfilled. What more could
she ask?
Whether she passed away in Khu-aten, or Tel-el-Amarna, we do
not know, but if the former was the case a long mourning
procession, attended with every honor, must have borne her
inanimate form preserved in the highest style of the embalmer’s art,
back to Thebes, for there in the Tombs of the Queens her last
resting place has been found. These tombs are at the end of a
valley, which extends for nearly a mile to the west of the temple of
Medinet Habu, that of Tyi is said to be among the most perfect. The
valley which leads to the tombs has bare and lofty limestone cliffs on
either side, which are covered with inscriptions; it is not so familiar
as some other places in Egypt, not being very easy of access. More
than twenty tombs in various stages of completion have been
discovered, some of them mere caves with their records often made
not in the solid stone, but in plaster. Queen Tyi’s tomb consists of an
ante-chamber, passages, a chapel, and small chambers, all more or
less decorated with paintings. At the entrance, on either side, is
Maat, the goddess of Truth, with extended wings, to protect those
who come in. There are various pictures of the gods and of Queen
Tyi, in one of which she prays to them, seated at a banquet table.
Of these tombs Curtis says, “The sculpture and paintings are
gracious and simple. They are not graceful, but suggest the grace
and repose which the ideal of female life requires. In the graceful
largeness and simplicity of the character of the decoration it seems
as if the secret or reverence for womanly character and influence,
which was to be later revealed was instinctively suggested by those
who knew them not. The cheerful yellow hues of the walls and their
exposure to the day, the warm silence of the hills, seclusion, and the
rich luminous landscape in the vista of the steep valley, make these
tombs pleasant pavilions of memory.”
 CHAPTER THIRTEENTH.
NEFERTITI.

Before the death of Amenophis III he seems to have adopted the

frequent Egyptian habit of associating his son with him on the
throne, though the latter was probably young, as Queen Tyi appears
to have acted as regent after her husband’s death. Also, at the time
of his death, the father was negotiating for a marriage between his
heir and a Mitannian princess, the same country from which had
come Queen Tyi herself, and the wife of Thothmes IV. That the
existing relationship gave the new queen some title to the throne is
proved by her being spoken of as “the great heiress, princess of all
women,” and “the princess of South and North, the lady of both
lands,” which imply hereditary rights, possibly through the mother.
She was the daughter of Dushratta, King of Mitanni, and it may
have been that her father was Queen Tyi’s brother and she herself
the cousin of Amenophis IV, but the matter is not absolutely clear. A
certain Dushratta, not satisfied about the safety of his sister, who
had married Amenophis III, had sent to Egypt to inquire after her,
but the repetition or duplication of a name often makes it difficult to
decide upon the exact relationship. From the letters found on tablets
in the ruins of Tel-el-Amarna, many of which of course are broken
and imperfect, we have chiefly derived the information we possess
of these transactions. Queen Tyi seems also to have held the power
for a brief period at Tel-el-Amarna, but exactly when this was the
case has not been discovered.
In her own country the bride-elect bore the name of Tadukipa, but
in Egypt she became Nefert-Thi, Nefertity, or Nefertiti, her full name
being known as Aten’nefer’ neferu’nefertiti. After the death of
Amenophis III Queen Tyi sent word of this event to the Babylonish
prince, and some correspondence took place between them before
matters were finally settled and Amenophis IV or Napkhurruiya, as
he is called in the letters, was married and assumed full control of
his own affairs. There was, of course, an exchange of presents, gold,
slaves, etc., as was usual on such occasions, and no failure on either
side of a satisfactory pecuniary showing seems to have interfered
with the prospects of the youthful pair, such as had been known, not
unfrequently, in other cases.
The beautiful, deserving or undeserving, are apt to win favor. By
this rule therefore the pictures of King Khu-n-aten or Aten’
nefer’neferu and Queen Nefertiti are sufficiently ugly to prejudice the
most casual observer. One is tempted to see in these hideous
effigies rather the work of a defamer than a true portrait. Early
pictures of the king are handsome and not unlike some of Rameses
II, the change is attributed by late writers to the new style of art to
be seen in his reign. Certainly the king sacrificed himself nobly to the
cause of Truth, if he was a consenting party to his own portraiture.
It is believed that the accession of Khu-n-aten took place in the
thirty-first year of his father’s reign, in the month Pakhons, or
February, and that his marriage occurred in the month Epiphi, or
May, four years later. In his sixth year he abandoned the god Amon,
or Amen, and adopted the Aten worship. In his sixth year also, after
the birth of his second daughter, came the change of name and
facial type at Thebes, Maat only of the old divinities seems to have
been retained. The pictures of this period show rays of sunbeams
terminating in tiny hands which support the bodies, crowns, etc., of
the royal pair.
From first to last the queen is closely associated with her husband,
constantly pictured with him, a true companion and helpmate, a
faithful guardian of his children, and a devoted daughter to his
mother, possibly her aunt, whose name, in part, she seems to have
taken. As Kidijah upheld and supported Mahomet in the
promulgation of his newly received revelation, so did Nefertiti accept
and lend her wifely aid to the faith of her husband and his mother.
 A prayer or address to the rising sun is attributed to her and
shows the religious fervor with which she was penetrated.
“Thou disk of the sun, thou living god! there is none other beside
thee! Thou givest health to the eyes through thy beams, creator of
all beings. Thou goest up on the eastern horizon of the heavens to
dispense life to all whom thou hast created; to man, to four-footed
beasts, birds and all manner of creeping things on the earth, when
they live. Thus they behold thee and they go to sleep when thou
settest.
“Grant to thy son who loves thee life in truth to the Lord of the
land that he may live united with thee in eternity.
“Behold his wife the queen Nefert-i-Thi, may she live forevermore
and eternally by his side, well pleasing to thee she admires what
thou hast created day by day. He (the king) rejoices at the sight of
thy benefits. Grant him a long existence as king of the land.”
At Heliopolis the sun-god Ra had been specially worshipped. He
was pictured hawk-headed, surmounted by disk and uraeus, hence
with priests at Heliopolis the king may have been in greater
sympathy than with those at other points, where the various gods
were worshipped. It is possible, too, that they were less antagonistic
to him than the others, or may even have supported him. Be that as
it may, at Heliopolis Khu-n-aten built a temple. The shrine received
gifts from Pharaoh after Pharaoh and was very wealthy. It also had
at one time an immense library. “The city,” says Strabo, who came to
it shortly after the Christian Era, “is situated upon a large mound. It
contains the Temple of the Sun,” probably a later one than that of
Amenophis IV, “and the Ox Mnevis, which is kept in a sanctuary, and
is regarded by the inhabitants as a god.” Says Pollard, “The temple
had three courts, each one probably adorned with obelisks, which
were so numerous that one was called ‘The City of Obelisks.’
Pharaohs of different dynasties erected a pair of obelisks in the
temple of the Sun as an offering and a memorial. After the third
court came the Naos, with its outer chamber or holy place and its
inner or holy of holies, in which was the shrine with the symbol of
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